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December 31, 2024
Tuscaloosa, Alabama – A Bama fanbase lamenting the Crimson Tide’s absence from this year’s College Football Playoff were greeted with some good news on Monday as they learned the team’s official record-keeper had taken another look at the powerhouse program’s storied history and ultimately concluded the national title count was low.
“2003, 2004, those are both vacant, so that’s low-hanging fruit,” said Cletus Beauregard, Bama’s 81-year old team historian via landline telephone interview late on Monday. “We look at it like the college football version of squatter’s rights. We’re basically telling the rest of the college football world: ‘Do something about it,’” Beauregard exclaimed.
The full list of newly claimed titles was shared with CFB News Now via fax and can be found below. Notes not appearing in quotations are CFB News Now’s:
- 1897 (A season in which the Crimson Tide played only one game)
- 1955 (Bama went 0-10 that season, but Beauregard notes—without citation—that the official record represents a typographical error in which the wins and losses were simply transposed)
- 1957 (One of Auburn’s two national championship-winning seasons; Beauregard simply noted, “Roll Damn Tide,” next to the year)
- 1966 (Coincidentally the same year Beauregard graduated from Bama)
- 1969 (No reasoning provided)
- 1977 (“Bear deserved a three-peat at some point, doggone it.”)
- 2003 (The first of two consecutive titles vacated by USC; Bama went 4-9 that season and missed a bowl game entirely)
- 2004 (The second of two vacated USC championships; Bama went 6-6 that season)
- 2010 (Auburn’s other national championship season; “Cam Newton doesn’t count,” Beauregard noted)
- 2021 (Beauregard notes that the Crimson Tide beat the eventual national champion Georgia Bulldogs in the SEC Championship game, and thus, through transitive logic, should also be awarded at least a share of the title)
When asked how the new national championship seasons would be displayed within the stadium amongst an already crowded row of 18 other somewhat legitimate titles, Beauregard said simply, “That’s a question for the facilities manager.”
